


Compulsion

by Viridian5



Category: Saiyuki (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Challenge Response, Drama, M/M, Modern Setting, Multi, Post-Canon, Reincarnation, Reunions, Vampire Hunters, Vampires
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-15
Updated: 2020-10-15
Packaged: 2021-03-08 19:14:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,854
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27021844
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Viridian5/pseuds/Viridian5
Summary: Four people reunite in a new life, but one’s a vampire, two are vampire hunters, and one is a pain in the ass.
Relationships: Cho Hakkai/Sha Gojyo, Genjo Sanzo/Son Goku, past Cho Hakkai/Cho Kanan/Sha Gojyo
Comments: 6
Kudos: 27





	Compulsion

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by [2020 Saiyuki Party](https://saiyuki-party.dreamwidth.org/)’s vampire theme, though this fic is much longer and took longer to write than the basic rules suggested because my plotkitten demanded more and more worldbuilding. Thanks to Akira 17 for reading for me.

“Checking in,” Kory said to their backup outside over the comm. “Room 4B is clear. We’ve dropped ten here. Goku and I sense at least one other vampire still in the building elsewhere, so we’re now moving out into the hall to find it, and going comm silent.” 

“Got it. Happy hunting.” If they didn’t hear from Kory and Goku with words or a “ping, we’re still here” within 30 minutes, they’d ping Kory and Goku, and if that didn’t get a ping back they’d come in prepared for war. Especially with what had been going on lately.

Vampires usually preferred to be subtle and almost invisible, hunting for prey in large cities and targeting people who wouldn’t be missed as much or whose family would be less likely to report anything going on to the police. Once in a while, Kory would overhear some asshole saying that vampires actually did a public service by taking out the homeless, junkies, immigrants, and non-English speakers. Some assholes included espers, the poor, the mentally ill, and LGBTQIA+ people to the list of expendable vampire fodder. Not all monsters were supernatural. 

Too bad Kory couldn’t legally kill the non-supernatural ones. Unless he could somehow explain it as self-defense. Which he’d sometimes managed in the past. 

But some local vampires had chosen a victim badly recently, and her literature teacher brother killed about 56 vampires--at least, the department knew about 56--trying to get her back and get revenge. She’d died, and her brother disappeared and might also be dead. After that, subtlety flew out the window and now they had vampires coming in from fucking _Jersey_ to back-up the survivors, who had become more openly violent and were also making new vampires at a very high rate. In Kory’s two years as a hunter, this week had been the busiest he’d ever had, and even people who mostly overlooked and shit-talked the hunter department were thanking them for their service lately. 

The department hunted predatory demons, werewolves, and ghosts too, but Kory had a special, personal hatred for vampires.

Going out the door into the hallway, Goku transformed his bo staff into its three-sectioned edition to make it more useful in the narrower confines, while Kory had his gun ready as usual. The department had a Goku working for them on and off since he arrived in New York City in 1873 but only a few people knew that it was one person instead of a line of family members. (When Goku first entered the United States in San Francisco, an intake person asked, “First name ‘Son,’ last name ‘Goku’?” and Goku, not terribly fluent in English anyway and unaware of American naming conventions at the time, had answered, “Yes!”) Goku made up a new given name every few decades or so--right now he was Peter Goku, which was somehow hilarious--and people in the know in the department secured the right paperwork for it, since he was an irreplaceable hunter and fighter. 

He claimed that Kory had also served in a few different lives and that they partnered together every time. In his cynicism, Kory would like to deny it but he’d felt their bond and the sense of familiarity from the very beginning. They made a great team, a sharpshooting esper and a supernatural who protected humans. Not that blessed silver-plated bullets were Kory’s only weapon; he also handled stakes and blessed silver-plated knives well. 

They heard someone running in the distance--no, two people, and at least one was a vampire--coming closer, so they stationed themselves at the corner to wait in ambush. When two runners turned the corner, Goku started to strike at them, then inexplicably stopped, even though the dark-haired one was a vampire and the redhead with a baseball bat next to him had a slight taint of vampire. This close to them, Kory had no doubt and prepared to shoot--

Goku grabbed the barrel of his gun and pointed it away from his targets while saying, “We _know_ them! And they know us.”

Shit, now that Goku said it Kory could feel a bit of that too, but it didn’t matter. “One’s a vampire and the other is his thrall! And they’re both armed!”

The redhead said, “We won’t hurt you if you won’t hurt us, and I’m not a thrall.”

“He’s a _vampire_ ,” Kory replied. “People die so he can continue living. Over a long life, that’s quite a body count.”

“He doesn’t kill people for food! He’s a good guy!” the redhead continued. “Can you put the gun down?”

“No. He’s _fed_ off you! That doesn’t make you an objective party here!”

“It proves he’s not killing people to survive!”

“It only proves that one time he hasn’t! And maybe he’s saving you for later! Or maybe you’re his junkie minion.”

Vampires fangs hurt like hell when they first punctured skin but then their venom made the experience feel so pleasurable that their victims stopped fighting. So pleasurable that some people became addicted to getting their blood drained like that and happily slaved away for their vampire fix, protecting their master and doing daylight tasks for them. Win-win for the vampire, who also still kept killing other people for sustenance. 

Kory had two sets of puncture marks on his right wrist--one set fourteen years old and the other eight--that let him know from experience. How it felt and how hard it had been to fight back through it. The first time he’d been six years old. He had to wear a bandage over them so they didn’t brush against anything and send a shock of pleasure through him, still absurdly sensitive after all these years. Still a constant reminder after all these years. The vampire who’d made them sure as hell hadn’t had Kory’s best interests at heart, and when Kory succeeded in hunting him down he’d send the bastard straight to hell for that and everything else he’d done. 

“We’re _partners_ ,” the redhead said.

“Sure, you are.”

“I... do know you somehow,” the vampire said. “We don’t mean you any harm. If you don’t interfere with us, we can all go our own way.” He held a silver-plated hunter’s knife with blood on it, though he’d protected his skin from the metal with a thick glove.

It amped up Kory’s anger. “A hunter didn’t just _give_ that knife to you.”

“He was dead and no longer needed it. I didn’t kill him, but I wouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth. I’ve been using it to kill vampires, as it’s intended to do.”

The way he talked.... “You wouldn’t happen to be a literature teacher, would you? Henry Cho?”

From the look on the vampire’s face, Kory had guessed correctly. The redhead laughed and said, “Hey, you’re famous. At least in certain places. Look, hunters, the other vampires you fought to get here, they’re his enemies trying to kill him. If you know his name, you should already know they kidnapped his sister so he went after her and killed any vampires who tried to stop him.”

“One of them thought this would be a fitting revenge,” Cho said quietly. 

“He busted up a huge nest of vampires,” the redhead said. “We also just killed seven more. That has to be worth something to you.”

“You really think that made things much better?” Kory replied. “The local vampires are swarming around pissed off and more brutally violent as a result, like wasps after you hit their nest. Plus, they’re importing vampires from out of state to help and turning more people into vampires to make up for their loss.”

Cho did a bitter little laugh. “Truly, nothing I do makes a positive difference.”

“No, I’m not accepting that,” the redhead said. “If we go by what this guy says, nobody should kill vampires because it’s all hopeless anyway. Even though that puts him out of a job.”

“We’re professionals, with proven procedures and strategies. I’m sorry about your sister, but we can’t see everything and be everywhere and several laws prevent us from taking certain preemptive measures.” If Cho had come to the department about the situation, his sister might still be alive now but even Kory wasn’t a big enough asshole to say that. Cho’s current situation sucked, but Kory had a job to do, people to protect.

~ I won’t kill him, and I won’t let you kill him either, ~ Goku said over their bond, apparently sensing Kory’s train of thought.

~ You said we reincarnate, ~ Kory answered. ~ If that’s so, if we kill him now he has the chance to come back as something alive. ~

~ But they’ve found each other! ~

~ Why would that-- If this is just about them being able to fuck each other, I don’t give a shit! Also, I don’t want to think about vampire sex! ~

Goku said, “This isn’t a good time or place to talk. Can you meet up with us later, when we’re off-duty?”

The redhead answered, “He’s a _good_ vampire.”

Kory said, “We are _vampire killers_. Any good he does doesn’t outweigh the fact that he drinks human blood to live and we only have your word that he doesn’t kill or enslave anyone doing it. By our department’s standards, I should be killing him _right now_.”

“So why aren’t you?” Asked with this smug little smile.

Goku tightened his grip on Kory’s gun, keeping it pointed away, even as he muttered, “He never changes. Why is he like this with you? Don’t let him wind you up.”

Cho put a hand on the redhead’s shoulder and squeezed a bit, giving him a reproving look as he said, “Joe. You’re really not helping at the moment.”

“Yeah, can you stop him from doing that?” Goku asked. “Kory has really good reasons to hate vampires and doesn’t need anyone daring him to kill them.”

Kory felt a stab of betrayal at Goku revealing that, and revealing his _name_ , and from Goku’s sudden small flinch he knew it. Good. 

“I would like to meet up elsewhere to talk,” Cho replied. “Veselka maybe? Do you know where it is?”

“They’d know what you are immediately, and a lot of the department likes to eat there after night hunts, so no,” Kory said. 

“I suppose I should be careful of any local restaurants that stay open late. Washington Square Park? At midnight?” As if Kory not killing him had already been settled.

“We should be done with the mission report by then, so yeah,” Goku said. “But would you recognize us out of our tactical gear?” They wore tactical clothing, body armor, and helmets with visors, and the weapons and gear they carried made them look bulkier.

“He will,” Joe answered. By scent, or by the goddamn beacon Kory’s esper power made him to things that liked to eat people. The department sometimes used him as monster bait for just that reason, which Kory didn’t even mind much since bringing the monsters out into the open made them easier--and gave him a legal license--to kill. 

“Our backup and clean-up crew will be coming in soon,” Kory said. “I don’t know if you’ll be able to get out of here without them noticing, and if they do I can’t stop their deadly reaction to you.” 

~ We’ll have to make up some story on why we hadn’t killed the vampire we’d mentioned and explain any smashed corpses that had faced Joe’s bat. I hope you’re ready to lie, Goku, and lie well. ~ Because although Kory wouldn’t reveal anything about what really happened for Goku’s sake, he sure as hell wouldn’t openly lie about it because he shouldn’t have to. 

~ Yeah, I can do that. I’ve gotten good at it over the years. ~ 

Kory refused to respond to the deep sadness Goku radiated during that last sentence. 

“Noted. We’ll leave the way we came in,” Cho replied as he picked up his friend/thrall in a princess carry hold, to Joe’s sputtering consternation. “We’ll see you later.” He zipped down the hall with him, just disappeared at high speed, showing a lot of power and control for a fledgling vampire, increasing Kory’s unease over the situation. 

“It’ll be okay,” Goku said. “It’ll work out. They’re worth it.” Despite his age, Goku was still, somehow, an optimist. And he knew how to lie.

  


* * *

Kory almost welcomed the autumn chill in the air as he and Goku finally walked out of the precinct into the night, glad to get away from the questions. While Goku had done most of the lying about what had happened, Kory had been asked to corroborate some of it, which he resented like hell. That vampire and his thrall had no idea how much they’d asked of him and probably didn’t care. _Goku_ did though, and now he’d be asking even more of Kory by making him go to this clandestine meeting with them. 

Kory pushed his cold hands deeper into the pockets of his leather coat, very aware of the heavy, blessed silver-plated rings he had on his fingers. He also had his gun with the blessed ammo and a similarly plated knife on him. If Cho tried anything, Kory would make him regret it. If Joe tried anything, Kory would show a little more mercy, but that only went so far. 

“You’re gonna be pissed off all night, huh?” Goku asked.

“Probably. Some of it will depend on what those two do and say.”

“I know you don’t remember anywhere near as much as I do, but they’re great friends and they had our backs.”

“I remember enough to know that Joe is a pain in the ass and Cho can be... disturbing sometimes.” Although he hated knowing things he shouldn’t know, he’d been an esper his whole life so he hadn’t gotten much of a choice. 

“Heh.”

“It would’ve been nice if you could’ve denied it.”

They spent most of their walk to Washington Square Park in a semi-comfortable silence, probably because Goku knew that talking about this more would only further piss Kory off and Kory knew that if he said anything he’d mostly be bitching about the situation. Once they arrived, their senses led them to one of the tables with a chess board incised into the top. Henry Cho and Joe sat on one side of the table, so Kory and Goku sat on the other side, facing them. Kory appreciated that the lighting was pretty good here.

So here he was sitting across from two people he supposedly knew from previous lives but in this life should kill one for the public good and get the other into rehab, though many thralls killed themselves after their vampire master died. Joe seemed to have more animation and free will than most thralls had, but he also hadn’t had Cho feeding off him for long. 

“Holy shit,” Joe said. “Aren’t you two kinda young for this?”

“A lot of us don’t survive long enough to get old,” Kory answered.

“...now I kinda feel like a dick.”

“Good.”

“But you especially! The murderous, salty guy with the gun is a _child_!”

“I’m 20 years old.”

“You turned 20 yesterday?”

“No. Anyway, I got yanked into this job young. I have a whole tragic backstory that I’m not gonna force you to hear.”

“I wouldn’t mind. Really.”

That threw Kory. Aside from Goku and people in the department, nobody ever wanted to hear what he’d been through. A lot of people tried to ignore the weirder things out there that could hurt them, as if they could avoid becoming victims by refusing to think or talk about them. Six-year-old Kory wanting to verbally unload some of his trauma might have _infected_ them with monster cooties. His foster father had only been able to deal with hearing much of it to a limited extent because he felt guilty that his super creepy vampire friend had been Kory’s attacker and only known about Kory because of their friendship. Heaven forbid Kory made anyone uncomfortable. 

He’d quickly learned to keep things to himself, and he wouldn’t be changing that now, especially not to a stranger palling around with a vampire. “I won’t subject you to it, and I don’t wanna hear your tragic backstory either.” 

“I’m older than I look,” Goku said, possibly to redirect the conversation.

“Yes. You’re not actually human, are you?” Cho asked.

“I fight for humans,” Goku replied.

“He’s human enough for me,” Kory said, and felt Goku’s joy and gratitude like a flower blooming in the sun, making him a bit uncomfortable and embarrassed. But like hell some stranger, _especially_ a vampire, got to talk about Goku with that tone in front of Kory.

“I see. You said that more vampires are coming here from out of state?” Cho asked.

“From an offshoot clan in New Jersey as support. Thanks to you I have to deal with fucking bridge and tunnel vampires too now. And all the vampires are making more vampires to try to offset their losses. The two of you need to leave this to people who have the training, knowledge, and personnel to deal with it.”

“Or what, Blondie?” Joe asked. 

“Or I do what I wanted to do earlier and kill you both.”

Goku, knowing that Kory never went anywhere unarmed, put a hand over his where it rested on the cold table, to calm and quell. From the expressions on Joe’s face, Joe saw how completely serious Kory was but also needed to be a cocky asshole, but before he could say something stupid, Cho said, “Joe, please. We’ll never get anywhere if you keep daring him to murder us.”

“Murder, huh? How _do_ you feed?” Kory asked. 

Cho looked a bit uncomfortable at that. _Joe_ said, “He doesn’t kill anybody, and anyone he drinks off of he blurs their memory of it a bit so it’s not as shocking or addicting.”

“He messes with their memories and emotions? You don’t think that’s _also_ a kind of violation?”

Cho was a fucking fledgling and he was doing this shit without any kind of mentor to guide him. Kory hoped the vampire who’d turned him wasn’t dead so Kory could messily kill him himself for what he’d unleashed on the world. What the fuck. It also gave some explanation for the feeling of something brushing against his thoughts trying to get in and the compulsion to look Cho in the eyes that Kory kept experiencing and fighting. One of the reasons hunters had a visor on their helmets was to make it harder for vampires to lock eyes with them and mesmerize them. Since he couldn’t let Cho get away with this, Kory visualized a kind of electric fence around his mind and let Cho touch it and get a nice, very painful zap that made him flinch hard.

“You are _begging_ me to kill you,” Kory said. “So _stop_.” 

Although he could sometimes get too tired and accidents could happen, _he_ didn’t spend much time reading minds, invading people’s mental privacy, without consent because he had morals and valued his own privacy. Plus, it was technically illegal if you weren’t in law enforcement, and a lot of people’s unedited thoughts were really ugly and seeing them made him even more cynical and misanthropic anyway. In a lot of cases he’d rather not know.

Goku slammed his staff down across the table, startling Cho and Joe, and said, “If you keep trying to mess with his mind, you get nothing from us, except maybe death, so cut it out! You’re better than this!” At least Goku sometimes had his back during this meeting. 

“I’m sorry,” Cho replied. “It can feel like something is living inside my body with me, and it’s so strong that I can’t always resist. It’s so _hungry_.”

“You have to be very careful with that hunger,” Kory said. “It can get overwhelming and take you over and it’s indiscriminate, and that usually starts massacres. You could get so hungry that you drink Joe dry and then throw yourself on the next person nearby without a care. Once in a while someone tries to reinvent the wheel and talks about imprisoning and rehabilitating vampires instead of killing them, but the problem with vampires is that they need fresh human blood to live and they feed on psychic energy and death almost as much as they do on blood. Draining animals doesn’t sate the hunger. Feeding from a blood bag or taking smaller drinks off people aren’t always enough either. Any corpses you give vampires have to be very freshly dead, which poses a major moral problem. The blood of very sick people also isn’t satisfying enough.” Henry Cho and Joe needed to know the reality of their situation, for their sake and the sake of anyone near them. Hopefully, they’d make the right, responsible choice on their own but Kory doubted it.

Although Cho looked somewhat sickened and stricken, he said softly, “You’re not exactly an objective, disinterested party in this, not when you shine so brightly and smell so delicious.”

“What?” Joe asked, confused.

“For me, it’s self-defense,” Kory answered. “The law is generally cool with that. If somebody tries to devour me, I’ll kill ’em. So many things wanting to eat me just means I kill a lot more.” 

“Joe, this boy is an esper,” Cho said. “Apparently, vampires see them as very attractive prey to feed on. Thus, his attitude.”

“That has to suck,” Joe replied, “but it’s no reason for him to take it out on you.”

“Do you think vampires get lucky in their choice of people to make into vampires?” Kory asked. “That they only turn people who have already killed and would be fine with the vampire lifestyle? No, they turn regular people who’d never murder anyone, and the hunger and power that come with the change make these regular people into killers who drain humans to death every night so they can live their long unlives. Is Mr. Cho going to _successfully_ battle that hunger for his entire immortality? Probably not. I’m not even sure he’s doing it now.” Although Kory wouldn’t take the chance of looking Henry Cho in the eyes, he could still tell that he’d landed a very solid hit and forced him to think. 

“I didn’t bring _you_ here for _this_ either, Kory!” Goku said. 

~ If he goes on a killing spree after we let him live, those murders are on _us_ , because we didn’t stop him, ~ Kory answered. ~ He’s not killing people to feed on now--or so he and his boyfriend/food source say--but he thinks he’s getting around the enslaving people thing by mindfucking them into not realizing they were drained and overwhelmed, which isn’t right either and there’s no point in pretending it is! What happened to Cho and his sister wasn’t fair, but life isn’t fair, shit happens to a lot of people, and let’s not let him create even more victims in an attempt to make it up to him. This isn’t just my bad experiences and trauma speaking; if you asked anyone in the department, they’d have the same answer. You’ve seen things yourself! My conscience is having trouble dealing with this, what about yours? ~

~ I know and I’m sorry, but there has to be some way to make things work out better! I just don’t have it yet. Give me a chance! ~

Goku’s optimism. But maybe he needed that to be able to bear living such a long life and watching everyone around him, people he loved, die over and over. How much more would it hurt to watch his loved ones kill each other? Goku _really_ wanted them all to be friends again. 

Joe glared daggers at Kory as he had his arm around the shoulders of a distraught looking Henry Cho. Well, he wasn’t doing this for Joe, he was doing it for Goku. 

Kory stood and stretched, then said, “I’ll give you a week to figure out a solution, Goku.” He doubted Goku would come up with a good one in a week or two weeks or a month, but Goku would appreciate being given an opportunity to try. Given that Kory didn’t see how Goku could possibly make this work out, he expected Goku to try to negotiate for more time at the end of the week. “If these two do something blatant or stupid that gets the department’s attention, I can’t do anything about _that_ , but I won’t make a move or say anything against them within that week unless I get orders. If they attack me, I will defend myself, but otherwise... yeah. Don’t make me regret it. Now I’m gonna go sit on that bench all the way over there to make sure neither of these two do or say something in front of me that’ll make me change my mind.” The wave of gratitude Goku sent him in response nearly made his knees buckle but outwardly he kept his cool. 

As he walked away from the table, he lit up a cigarette because God, did he need it and deserve it. Joe yelled, “You’re not old enough to smoke!” as if Joe hadn’t started smoking even younger. Kory flipped him the middle finger in response. 

  


* * *

Between the massive temptation the esper boy presented to Henry’s vampiric hunger and the blessed silver rings on Kory’s fingers, Henry felt much more comfortable once Kory left the table to sit on a bench about ten feet away. The part of him that wasn’t a monster now couldn’t help being charmed and almost impressed that Kory had come to this meeting willing and fully prepared to punch a vampire in the face if it became necessary. Although he’d wanted to meet with the two hunters to get more information to help his own hunting, he couldn’t blame Kory for distrusting him and Joe and agreed with a lot of the points the boy made. After all, he disgusted himself now. Kory had come up with even more reasons why Henry should kill himself to protect the people around him. To protect Joe especially, though Joe wouldn’t agree and had already talked him out of it a few times. 

He _liked_ Kory, while usually it took him a long time to warm up to people.

Him knowing Joe in a past life made more sense of how quickly _they’d_ become friendly in this one. They’d met while Henry had been having a bad day, one of those “death of a thousand papercuts” kind of days, when Henry was at his most introverted, miserable, and unfriendly. It had been raining hard, and Henry had done the umbrella dance along with everyone on the crowded sidewalk as he moved himself and his umbrella to stop his umbrella from colliding with someone else or their umbrella. His umbrella and Joe’s had interlocked, but instead of being annoyed Joe had talked to him instead, pleasantries and small talk that would usually aggravate Henry but this time put him at ease. Joe had been so charming and calming that he’d talked Henry into having a drink with him at a nearby pub, even though Henry usually didn’t do any of that. They had a good time there and became gradually tipsy, and eventually Henry realized that he was drinking, flirting, and having a good time with a sexy, handsome man who seemed interested in him and he should feel like scum for it since he had a girlfriend. Simultaneously hoping mentioning her would end things and being sad that it would, Henry brought her up, but to his surprise Joe told him to see if he could get her to join them for a drink. He said nothing about her being his sister as well as his lover, but people generally figured that out once they saw her and the close family resemblance. 

She agreed and came to meet them. Although they’d been understandably wary of each other at first, Joe soon won Kate over, and his presence made her more playful, adorably so. Usually Henry would have dark thoughts about someone else being able to do that, and it had been a relief when that didn’t happen. Somehow, they’d become a throuple and made it work and been so happy. For five and a half months, before the vampires ended it.

After vampires had kidnapped Kate, Henry initially let Joe help him track down the culprits but as time passed and Henry became more desperate and angrier, a lot of dark thoughts came out in force and he’d lashed out at Joe and pushed him away as hard as he could, saying a lot of truly _horrible_ things to him and making wild accusations. Thankfully, Joe hadn’t moved in with him and Kate yet because if Henry saw Joe in his home while Kate was missing it would hurt and he would have been even worse. In more “rational” moments, he excused these actions by saying that he didn’t want to get Joe deeper into this and possibly killed so he was _protecting_ Joe by hurting him. 

He also didn’t deserve to get any comforting from Joe while his sister suffered in captivity and might even be dead. 

Would Joe have held him back from killing vampires or killed at his side? Would Kate still be alive if both of them had come for her? Would the vampires have killed Joe or turned him into a vampire too? Henry would never know.

In his distraction and horror at Kate killing herself in front of him, Henry was overpowered by vampires, who drained him of blood, nearly to death, and then forced him to ingest vampire blood to turn him into one. Starving, overwhelmed by vampiric hunger, Henry lost a few hours but gradually came back to sense covered in blood and surrounded by dead bodies, some of them vampires, some of them human, all killed by him. He had enough awareness to know that he’d _fed_ off those humans. And he was still so _hungry_. 

He hadn’t expected Joe to be waiting at his apartment.

“I’m sorry,” the other hunter (was Goku his real name?) said, “but he’s had some really bad encounters with vampires and a lot of good reasons to distrust them. Even before he took this job.”

“I can’t blame him for it, not with my recent experiences,” Henry replied. “I wasn’t even trying to touch his mind to be aggressive or influence him, I just find him interesting.” Kory was about the age of Henry’s former students yet had been through so much and gained so much experience fighting vampires. Had Henry ever met an esper in person before? He probably had but hadn’t known because he could see how they wouldn’t announce it to everyone, not when society considered them potentially useful tools at best and creepy freaks with too much power who could easily hurt people and needed to be registered and supervised by the authorities at worst. Henry hadn’t known that vampires also considered them to be particularly tasty treats.

Joe laughed. “Henry, that’s....”

“I know, I know.”

He even understood Kory’s mistrust of thralls, having been fed upon himself and seen what being fed on had done to Kate. The first moment she had one of his knives she’d killed herself, since she couldn’t harm her vampire master. If she hadn’t seen him and felt judged, felt _shame_ , if she hadn’t gotten her hands on a knife he brought with him, she’d probably still be alive now. A vampire’s slave, but alive. Would it be better? The thought horrified him but.... 

It had been such a relief that he found a way to minimize the mental and emotional effects of being fed on by him, just a bit of telepathy to make it less staggering and addicting, but he did still worry about what he might be doing to Joe despite his best efforts. If given a choice he never would have fed on him to begin with. If he hadn’t been freshly turned and still starving, if Joe hadn’t been there and so convenient....

If Joe hadn’t still been there for him after that, Henry might have gone out into the sunlight to kill himself. He didn’t know if that was a good or bad thing.

But Henry could definitely see how Kory could view that telepathic gentling as another assault and a justification. In some scary moments, Henry wondered if he were just fooling himself and that Joe might be faking having free will because he knew his master wanted that. 

“I know that your partner would prefer for us to stop hunting vampires and leave it to the authorities and experts,” Henry said, “but if I’m not hunting them I see little reason for me to stay ‘alive’ as a vampire.”

The hunter looked stricken, while Joe put his hand on Henry’s shoulder, squeezed a little, and said, “Henry, _no_. Count me being heartbroken if you died as a reason to stay alive.”

“Give me time to think about all of this,” the hunter said. “Maybe I can come up with _something_. Please don’t kill yourself yet! Let’s exchange phone numbers, okay?” Whatever he was, Henry’s vampire hunger didn’t find him terribly appealing. Sure, it would drain him to death if it came down to it, but it didn’t see him as the delectable meal it considered Kory. 

“Yeah, let’s,” Joe answered. “What should we call you anyway? We didn’t catch your name yet.” Hunters had their badge numbers but not their names on their uniforms. 

“I’m Goku.”

“Like in _Journey to the West_?” Henry asked.

“Or _Dragon Ball Z_?” Joe asked.

A few expressions flickered quickly across Goku’s face before he answered, “Neither. I’m just me. Though being able to go Super Saiyan would be a great thing to have for my job.”

As Henry started to take out his phone, Joe very aggressively gave Goku _his_ phone, so much so that Henry asked, “Don’t you trust me?” The _look_ Joe shot him in reply.… “I feel very disrespected, Joe.”

“You’ll live with it. I’ll have more peace of mind this way, and isn’t that something you want for me?”

“So manipulative.”

“I’m beauty _plus_ brains, and you love that about me.”

Goku smiled at them so _fondly_ over their repartee. Henry knew that Kory would’ve already killed him and possibly Joe too several times over if not for Goku’s feelings for them. In fact, it looked like Kory had been staring at them intently and smoking like a chimney on his bench the whole time, probably ready to charge in if he thought they posed an immediate threat to his partner. (Smoked, not vaped. Joe smoked too, and Henry wondered if that signified anything about them.) So sweet. 

The cold, dark part of him that wasn’t _just_ his vampire hunger thought he might be able to use all that, if necessary. 

Having exchanged contact information with Joe, Goku said, “Bye! You _will_ hear from me!” as he walked away to meet up with Kory. 

With the distraction gone, Henry became aware again of how many people were in the park even after midnight, a lot of them students from nearby colleges and universities, young and vital and coursing with blood and energy. They threw off so much delicious heat, more than they needed, more than enough to ward off some of the cold he felt....

“ _Henry_ ,” Joe said, as if he’d already called Henry’s name a few times. 

Or he could feed off Joe again, and Joe would let him, and wouldn’t that be far too easy? 

He could at least hold himself together long enough to let the hunters leave the area first. “I think I’m getting too dangerous to be around other people right now.”

“Yeah, you’re getting hangry again.”

“Wasn’t there a snack commercial about that?”

“‘You’re not you when you’re hangry.’ Wait, I might be putting two commercials together. But yeah.” Joe seemed poised to say something but abruptly stopped. 

“Were you just about to say that we could find someone for me to feed on?” He’d forced Joe to become this. 

“Or you could snack on me. Huh, this may be the one time when I’d say that I’m a snack and not a whole damn meal.”

“Joe!”

“Look, I _know_ you and I want you to stick around. Every time we walk, we could be walking on bugs or grass, and they’re all alive, but we still have to walk. We eat plants, and plants are alive and maybe even feel things. People all breathe oxygen, so me taking in oxygen means someone else doesn’t have that bit of oxygen. Then we breathe out carbon dioxide and the trees use that.”

“I don’t need to breathe anymore.”

“So, more oxygen for me.”

“Joe.”

“Everything feeds on something to keep going. Circle of life. I might have some bad feelings about you mass-murdering humans, but the rest I can deal with. Besides,” Joe got an indecipherable look on his face, “you don’t know much about my past. I’ve done things to survive sometimes that I’d rather not talk much about. Did you notice that I didn’t have all that much trouble getting used to bashing skulls in? Yeah.”

Oooh. “Is it terribly wrong of me that hearing that gave me a little thrill?”

“Maybe. Probably. I don’t mind. I have to eat, and sometime during that we’ll figure something out for you. I mean... I love you, man. I just lost Kate and I can’t deal with losing you too.”

In his self-absorption and selfishness--obsessing over his feelings, his grief, his transformation into an undead fiend--Henry hadn’t really thought about that, about _Joe_ , who’d loved Kate too. Annoyed at himself, determined to do better, Henry said, “I’m an idiot. I don’t know how you put up with me.”

Joe put an arm around his shoulders. “I’m kind of used to you, and you’re really pretty. Let’s blow this pop stand, okay? If I spend much more time under Blondie’s laser-eyed glare my head might catch fire.” 

“Yes, let’s.”

Joe was so precious and more than Henry deserved. God, Henry missed Kate, but maybe she wouldn’t mind him and Joe still being there for each other in her absence. 

  


* * *

Watching Kory stare at Henry and Joe, Goku asked, “You’re gonna be on high alert until they leave the park, aren’t you?”

“Are you kidding? I’m gonna be on high alert for _days_.”

“I’m sorry. I know I asked a lot of you tonight.” Asked a _lot_ , but Kory did it anyway, going against his instincts and morals over and over because he could see how important these two people were to Goku. He did this in all of his lives, but Goku would never take it for granted and always saw that as a gift and sign of his love. 

Goku didn’t know how he’d make this vampire situation work out for these three people he loved but wouldn’t give up. There had to be a way! He’d use this week to think hard and then ask for more time if (when) he needed it. After all, he’d already gotten this much out of Kory. 

Then again, Kory only smoked this hard and this much when stressed out, and Kory deserved better than that. 

The park’s lighting was good enough that Goku could see the faint, adorable blush on Kory’s face as he looked up at him from his seat on the bench. “What else is new. Can we stop talking about it and reminding me of it for a while?”

“Sure. Hey, I’m hungry and Henry bringing up Veselka earlier made me wanna go there. I want pierogis!”

“That’s doable. I’ll call them in advance so they know to get them started before we arrive. Your usual of eight meat, eight potato, and eight bacon, egg and cheese?”

“Yes! You’re the best! I love you.”

Sanzo was particularly pretty in this life, especially when he smiled like this. Like, his eyes were a gorgeous, crystalline blue for one thing. Goku loved to look at him but never brought it up since Sanzo’s good looks in every life never attracted _good_ attention and they both knew it. That perverted crow bastard might be a little less fixated on fucking with him if he didn’t have the added incentive of twisting, scarring, and destroying something beautiful. Kory wouldn’t be as intent on killing vampires if said crow bastard hadn’t already tried to make him into his thrall twice in this life. 

Goku wouldn’t tell Kory that Henry might give up on living if Joe died because, aware that he’d already asked a _lot_ , he really didn’t want to give Kory that kind of temptation. He knew too well that it could be so hard having a much longer lifespan than the people you loved. 

### End


End file.
